Greenberg Quotes & Sayings

One is also reminded of how, in art, the tortoise so often overtakes the hare ... — Clement Greenberg

I want to be a playwright the way people are bank tellers. I want to keep doing it and have it go steadily and smoothly. — Richard Greenberg

My wife made me get a cellphone, which I keep in my briefcase. I've never used it. — Alan C. Greenberg

With an 'advanced' artist, it's not now possible to make a portrait. — Clement Greenberg

You know, the thing is with people who never talk, the thing is you always suppose they're harbouring some enormous secret. But, just possibly, the secret is, they have absolutely nothing to say. — Richard Greenberg

The ultimate goal is a comprehensive classification of what is very likely a single language family. The implications of such a classification for the origin and history of our species would, of course, be very great. — Joseph H. Greenberg

I don't get into 'becauses.' When you come into a studio you see a number of works. My habit is to go to the one I like most. If you start to say, 'because,' you get into art jargon. — Clement Greenberg

They're like Generation X on steroids. They walk in with high expectations for themselves, their employer, their boss. If you thought you saw a clash when Generation X came into the workplace - that was the fake punch. The haymaker is coming now. — Paul Greenberg

I rehearsed Foucault's argument that the presence of madness on our doorstep is good for us, for it reminds us the life we live is only one among several human possibilities. — Michael Greenberg

I grew up in St. Louis, and I just couldn't wait until I turned 18 because I wanted to move to New York. — Bryan Greenberg

She thinks that if she gives it up, she'll lose the great abilities she believes she's acquired. It's a terrible paradox really: the mind falls in love with psychosis. The evil seduction, I call it. (186) — Michael Greenberg

Some go on to trade schools or get further training for jobs they are interested in. Some go into the arts, some are craftsmen, some take a little time out to travel, and some start their own businesses. But our graduates find and work at what they want to do. — Daniel Greenberg

A nut is someone whose noose broke. — Joanne Greenberg

Anybody can hear - it takes brains to listen. — Joanne Greenberg

I don't write a play from beginning to end. I don't write an outline. I write scenes and moments as they occur to me. And I still write on a typewriter. It's not all in ether. It's on pages. I sequence them in a way that tends to make sense. Then I write what's missing, and that's my first draft. — Richard Greenberg

I was a big Oasis fan. — Bryan Greenberg

Seriously, my music really does help my acting, and, like, getting in and out of a character from a different lifestyle and writing a song about it. Likewise, my acting inspires the music because I can write a theme that I wouldn't necessarily approach at all in life. — Bryan Greenberg

What's most aggravating is feeling like I'm a radical for saying something so commonsense. — Arielle Greenberg

The art in photography is literary art before it is anything else: its triumphs and monuments are historical, anecdotal, reportorial, observational before they are purely pictorial ... The photograph has to tell a story if it is to work as art. — Clement Greenberg

I heard Yiddish when my father's family came to the house, which was as seldom as my mother could arrange it. — Joseph H. Greenberg

It would be wonderful if all the salmon we eat could be wild. But as one marine ecologist said to me recently, to continue to eat large wild fish at the rate we've been eating them we would need "four or five" oceans to support the crrent human population. — Paul Greenberg

If I want to die, what am I saving myself for? — Joanne Greenberg

She now knew that the death she feared might not be a physical one, that it could be death of the will, the soul, the mind, the laws, and thus not death, but a perpetual dying. — Joanne Greenberg

And if I fight, then for what?"
"For nothing easy or sweet, and I told you that last year and the year before that. For your own challenge, for your own mistakes and the punishment for them, for your own definition of love and of sanity - a good strong self with which to begin to live. — Joanne Greenberg

I get to dress how I want, but sometimes I gotta wear different hats. — Bryan Greenberg

I appreciate people who are civil, whether they mean it or not. I think: Be civil. Do not cherish your opinion over my feelings. There's a vanity to candor that isn't really worth it. Be kind. — Richard Greenberg

Many years ago, Clement Greenberg said, 'All profoundly original work looks ugly at first.' This should be updated now to 'All profoundly ugly work looks original at first. — Walter Darby Bannard

A standard line, promoted by people like Clement Greenberg, is that politics contaminates art, and Manet is often cited as an example of art for art's sake. — Hans Haacke

Humans seem to have an innate drive to master other creatures. — Paul Greenberg

With 'Greenberg,' I wanted to make a movie about Los Angeles ... my great love for it and also the way that I felt not at home and alienated there. — Noah Baumbach

But, if you observe children learning in their first few years of life, you can see that they can and do learn on their own - we leave them alone to crawl, walk, talk, and gain control over their bodies. It happens without much help from parents. — Daniel Greenberg

Emotion is not opposed to reason. Emotions guide and manage thought in fundamental ways and complement the deficiencies of thinking. — Les Greenberg

I'm hard pressed to give an example on the spot of a president who explicitly spoke of the vindication of history, but I'm confident that there are many such examples. — David Greenberg

When we hear a Mozart piano concerto today, we're most likely to hear the piano part played on a modern concert grand. In the hands of a professional pianist, such a piano can bury the strings and the winds and hold its own against the brass. But Mozart wasn't composing for a nine-foot-long, thousand-pound piano; he was composing for a five-and-a-half-foot-long, hundred-and-fifty-pound piano built from balsa wood and dental floss. — Robert Greenberg

If you watch young children play, you will notice that they create games, characters, situations, whole worlds in which they immerse themselves with intense concentration. — Daniel Greenberg

I myself happen to find, on the basis of experience and nothing else, that photography can be a high art. — Clement Greenberg

If a fan comes up and it is a middle-aged lady, it is probably from 'Prime'; if it is a younger girl, it is probably from when I guest-starred on 'One Tree Hill.' And if it is, like, a skateboard kid or a hipster kid, I can tell they are 'How to Make It' fans. — Bryan Greenberg

I become a better actor after I step on a stage in front of, like, 500 people when it's just me, a microphone and my guitar. You don't get as nervous walking into a room in front of 3 or 4 people and to do a scene or to walk on a set. You gain confidence. — Bryan Greenberg

We are the market, we know what we want. — Joshua Greenberg

Believe me, I know people who have doting Grandmas. Jessica's Grandma Pearl spent four years knitting her a blanket. Four years! And she's got arthritis. I wonder what Grandma Pearl would think if she knew Jessica lost her virginity to Michael Greenberg under the blanket she spent four years knitting with her crooked fingers. — Simone Elkeles

I don't know if I would refer to myself as a local celebrity. — Joshua Greenberg

The world requires me to re-write its wretched dialogue! — Richard Greenberg

The biggest battle in life is to change the negative stories we tell ourselves — Melanie Greenberg

The reality of art is disclosed only in experience, not in reflection upon experience. — Clement Greenberg

I have found this to be true, that one sin begets a dozen others. — Joanne Greenberg

The most dangerous fundamentalists aren't just waging war in Iraq; they're attacking evolution, blocking medical research and ignoring the environment. — Jill Greenberg

We may gamble on outsmarting the law; we may even gamble on the leniency of man and the mercy of God-but no man ever won a gamble with his own conscience. Even should he think he has beaten his conscience into submission, his misdeeds still leave their mark upon him. Anyone who gambles against this fact has already lost his gamble. — Sidney Greenberg

Never blame a text from the Bible for your behavior. It's irresponsible. Anybody who says X, Y, and Z is in the bible - it's as if one says, 'I have no role in evaluating this. — Steven Greenberg

We need to live in mindful harmony with our feelings, not attempt to control them. — Les Greenberg

I had a plot connection that nobody understood for this fourth character, and decided, Oh, nobody gets it, that's all. I'll write another draft to make her make sense. It took me awhile to learn that these three people were the core of this play, which seems so obvious now. — Richard Greenberg

Can you read my thoughts?" she asked them.
"Are you talking to me?" Lee said.
"To all of you. Can you read my thoughts?"
"What are you trying to do - get me sent to seclusion?"
"Go to hell", Helene said pleasantly.
"Don't look at me," Miss Coral said, with the genteel horror of a countess visiting an abattoir, "I can't even read my own. — Joanne Greenberg

A less well known impact of immigrant populations is the increase that destination states gain in Congress where apportionment of seats in the House of Representatives is calculated on the basis of a state's entire adult population regardless of legal status. And, because each state's electoral college vote is the sum of the number of its representatives in the House and its two senators, high immigration states play a larger role in presidential elections than they might if only adult citizens and legal aliens were counted in population surveys. — Edward S. Greenberg

As ecstatic as I was at the birth of my daughter, I felt selfish bringing her, and later my son, into our screwed-up world. — Jill Greenberg

All children blackmail their parents with their innocence. — Joanne Greenberg

My fans are probably largely female; it wasn't until 'How to Make it in America' that guys started coming up to me: 'You're Bryan Greenberg.' 'Yeah ... Don't hurt me. What do you want?' 'Love the show.' — Bryan Greenberg

It's all about one thing: creative problem-solving to get the story out. — Robert Greenberg

I'm pretty good with talking to girls if I have an introduction, but I'm the worst at trying to go pick up a girl. I'm really bad at breaking the ice. It's awkward! — Bryan Greenberg

I came to New York, and it was fascinating and intimidating and yielding, and all the stuff it's supposed to be. But whatever the abstract essence I was seeking, I couldn't find exactly that. — Richard Greenberg

Plato believed that insanity was essential to our nature and assumed that it held esoteric knowledge about who we are. — Michael Greenberg

Thousands of years ago, when kitties first domesticated humans, we did it so that someone would scratch our butts. — Didjeradoo Via Jeremy Greenberg

Love is the self-delusion we manufacture to justify the trouble we take to have sex. — Daniel S. Greenberg

People should make distinctions between the office of the presidency and the person who occupies it. You can respect the office even as you lose respect for the individual. — David Greenberg

You like it, that's all, whether it's a landscape or abstract. You like it. It hits you. You don't have to read it. The work of art-sculpture or painting-forces your eye. — Clement Greenberg

The thing about New York is it's like London: you want to go to the boutique places. You can go to the big department stores - Barney's, Bloomingdales and all that stuff - but I like the little stores. — Bryan Greenberg

See it? Oh, I have no interest in seeing it. Seeing it might get in the way of my opinion. — Richard Greenberg

Once efficiency is universally accepted as a rule, it becomes an inner compulsion and weighs like a sense of sin, simply because no one can ever be efficient enough, just as no one can ever be virtuous enough. And this new sense of sin only contributes further to the enervation of leisure, for the rich as well as the poor. The difficulty of carrying on a leisure-oriented tradition of culture in a work-oriented society is enough in itself to keep the present crisis in our culture unresolved. — Clement Greenberg

sublimation concept - in which the term refers to an actual deinstinctualization of drive rather than to a rechanneling of — Jay R. Greenberg

Positive emotions and mental states may make people more resilient to stress, like sturdy tree branches that bend but don't break when battered by a storm — Melanie Greenberg

My one complaint with my father as a parent is that, not only was he not a golfer, but also he was sort of opposed to golf. I was a country club kid growing up. I should have played golf, but my father thought golf was a sport for old men. — Mike Greenberg

At one point, I was painting shells and selling them at gas stations for five cents. I was six years old or something. — Joshua Greenberg

A poor life is lived by any one who doesn't regularly take time out to stand and gaze, or sit and listen, or touch, or smell, or brood, without any further end in mind, simply for the satisfaction gotten from what is gazed at, listened to, touched, smelled, or brooded upon. — Clement Greenberg

No statement, theological or otherwise, should be made that would not be credible in the presence of burning children. — Irving Greenberg

Worrying is one of my few forms of prayer. — Joanne Greenberg

Ghosts of the past still clutch at you in the present — Joanne Greenberg

For more than a decade, the United States had been giving large-scale military aid to the French colonialists, and then to the American-installed but authoritarian South Vietnamese government, to fight nationalists and communists in Vietnam. More than 23,000 U.S. military advisers were there by the end of 1964, occasionally engaging in combat. On the other side of the world, the American public knew and cared little about the guerrilla war. In fact, few knew exactly where Vietnam was. Nevertheless, people were willing to go along when their leaders told them that action was essential to resist communist aggression. — Edward S. Greenberg

But, neither of these educational scenarios worked for us, so when we started a family, we wanted a different school for our children. And the other founders felt the same way. — Daniel Greenberg

The paradox in the evolution of French painting from Courbet to Cezanne is how it was brought to the verge of abstraction in and by its very effort to transcribe visual appearance with ever greater fidelity. — Clement Greenberg

It seems that the hurdle you have to jump over is everyone's informed opinion. When you're a young playwright, you're probably too precarious in your own technique to understand that when these seemingly informed opinions are contradicting each other, it becomes this paralyzing monolith. — Richard Greenberg

The peasant finds no "natural" urgency within himself that will drive him toward Picasso in spite of all difficulties. In the end the peasant will go back to kitsch when he feels like looking at pictures, for he can enjoy kitsch without effort — Clement Greenberg

Money in the hand is real - coins and bills. The rest I don't believe in, and I don't think I ever did, really. What's a check, after all, but a promise - mine, the bank's. Me, I know, but the bank? — Joanne Greenberg

The skill of mindfulness allows you to remain grounded in the present moment even when you face difficult stressors, so that your stressful feelings feel more manageable.. — Melanie Greenberg

All profoundly original art looks ugly at first. — Clement Greenberg

I'm excited that 'The Good Guy' is getting distribution because indie movies they're not - people ran out of money and they're not making these movies anymore. It's all superhero movies or real obvious tent pole studio films. — Bryan Greenberg

I'm sorry I'm young," Deborah answered with a bitterness that was half prose. "We have a right to be as crazy as anyone else."
The second part was more a plea, and to her surprise the superbly inhuman fighter smiled softly and said, "Yes ... I suppose that's true, though I never thought of it in those terms before. — Joanne Greenberg

I would say my first golf memory was asking who Arnold Palmer was when he was always on the Pennzoil commercials. When I was a little kid I watched a lot of sports, but I didn't watch a lot of golf, and this guy was always on a tractor. — Mike Greenberg

Never, ever, take a "no" from someone who's not empowered to give you a "yes" in the first place. — Peter Greenberg

If Sally had been in an accident or come down with some overtly physical disease, I would not hesitate to tell him about it, confident that his sympathies would flow in my direction as a matter of course. But psychosis defies empathy; few people who have not experienced it up close buy the idea of a behavioral disease. It has the ring of an excuse, a license for self-absorption on the most extreme scale. It suggests that one chooses madness and not the other way around. (86) — Michael Greenberg

A play gets on Broadway by fluke. And you don't even start out with that ambition. When I do a play, the intention is just to put it up somewhere. — Richard Greenberg

Religion should not only comfort us when we are disturbed; it should also disturb us when we are comfortable. — Sidney Greenberg

Making children cry for a photographer can be considered mean. But I would say that making children laugh and show off their jeans for an apparel ad is just as exploitative and less natural. Toddlers' natural state, like, 30 percent of the time, is crying, and it doesn't indicate pain or suffering. — Jill Greenberg

It's actually quite common for presidents to believe that future generations will render a verdict on their presidencies that is more lasting or definitive than the judgments of their contemporaries. The reason is that although history is certainly "an argument without end" - we're still debating many age-old questions - time does help settle others. — David Greenberg

The Content Marketing Institute has derived a pithy one-sentence definition of this emerging field:5 "Content marketing is a marketing technique of creating and distributing relevant and valuable content to attract, acquire, and engage a clearly defined and understood target audience - with the objective of driving profitable customer action. — Eric Greenberg

Realistic, naturalistic art had dissembled the medium, using art to conceal art; Modernism used art to call attention to art. — Clement Greenberg

The rose-garden world of perfection is a lie ... and a bore, too! — Joanne Greenberg

Art is a matter strictly of experience, not of principles and what counts first and last in art is quality, all other things are secondary. — Clement Greenberg

The owners and top managers of most news media organizations tend to be conservative and Republican. This is hardly surprising. The shareholders and executives of multi-billion-dollar corporations are not very interested in undermining the free enterprise system, for example, income from offended advertisers. These owners and managers ultimately decide which reporters, newscasters, and editors to hire or fire, promote or discourage. Journalists who want to get a head, therefore, may have to come to terms with the policies of the people who own and run media businesses. — Edward S. Greenberg

It has become apparent that art can have a startling impact without really being or saying anything startling - or new. The character itself of being startling, spectacular, or upsetting has become conventionalized, part of safe good taste. — Clement Greenberg

When I got with Nina Greenberg, I had been running for a few months already without a trainer. But then she gave me a program and guided me through my runs, showing me how to take care of myself and letting me know I should ice my legs and stretch - stuff I hadn't been doing. — Flea

In deploring spin while also desiring it, Barack Obama is like the rest of us. We denounce spin when we see it as misleading. But we embrace spin when we see it as leading. — David Greenberg

There is nothing that you can do to me that my own craziness doesn't do to me smarter and faster and better. — Joanne Greenberg